Educators Must Have Free Speech, But Taxpayers Need Freedom Too

The day that conservative activist Charlie Kirk was murdered, Matthew Kargol, a teacher in the Oskaloosa, Iowa, school district, wrote on Facebook, “1 Nazi down.” Also taking to Facebook, Phillip Michael Hook, a professor at the University of South Dakota, wrote, “I have no thoughts or prayers for this hate spreading Nazi.” Meanwhile, Suzanne Swierc, an administrator at Indiana’s Ball State University, posted, “Charlie Kirk’s death is a reflection of the violence, fear, and hatred he sowed. It does not excuse his death, AND it’s a sad truth.”

These statements outraged many people, and it is not hard to see why. Kirk was killed while openly debating his ideas on a college campus, ideas with which many Americans agree.

All of the writers condemned Kirk as he lay dying, or soon after. And all were employed in public education, which is about nothing less than shaping minds.

Government officials moved swiftly against them.

Oskaloosa Superintendent Michael Fisher condemned Kargol’s statement and the teacher was fired soon after. South Dakota Speaker of the House Jon Hansen called Hook’s comments “hateful and vile,” and he contacted University of South Dakota President Sheila Gestring. Hook was dismissed. Swierc’s comments were submitted to Indiana’s “Eyes on Education” portal, directing them to state Attorney General Todd Rokita. Rokita decided Swierc’s speech was “celebrating or glorifying the tragedy,” and Swierc’s employment was terminated.

Justice was done, right? Wrong.

All three educators have sued their former employers, and Hook has already won a preliminary injunction against his firing. And all three should win.

No matter how offensive someone’s speech, government may not punish them for it, including public employees. As long as employees speak on their own time, with their own resources, and in their private capacity, they have a right to speak freely, just like everyone else. And they should: No one should have to surrender their fundamental rights in order to work for government.

But there is a huge flip side to this that is constantly ignored: While it is unacceptable for government to punish speech, forcing people to pay for educators — shapers of minds — who expound views they find abhorrent — left or right — also violates basic freedom.

Thankfully, there is a solution to this gross imbalance of freedom: End direct government funding of public institutions.

This could be done simply by ceasing state and local appropriations to public schools and universities and letting taxpayers keep their money.

If that seems too drastic, governments could hand dollars that would have gone directly to institutions to students to take to whatever schools they choose. Individuals, not government, would decide whether a school and its employees got funded.

The federal government already does this with Pell Grants and student loans, while vouchers, education savings accounts, and other K‑12 choice programs now serve around 1.2 million kids in 33 states. But there are still hundreds of billions of state and local government dollars going directly to public schools and colleges that could be given to students.

Attaching money to students will likely not end in an education system that perfectly reflects the political and moral views of the overall population. If students and their families have different ideological preferences than taxpayers broadly, funding will be biased.

But it is far better to let individuals avoid schools employing people with views they find repugnant than to make everyone fund a single institution.

Government must not punish people for their speech. But it also must no longer compel anyone to employ those speakers, especially in the business of shaping minds.